By His Side
by carmpietri
Summary: He wasn't holding Tsuzuki like he once had, but it was enough. Being by Tsuzuki's side now was like fresh air after suffocating. Tatsumi x. Tsuzuki For Tsuzuki's 106th birthday.


It's raining. Large drops pelt the ground and in the streets form streams that flow turbulently into the sewers. It's black outside, with only a few city lights and a stoplight changing from red to green to shed light on the violence. Purple forks litter the sky while wind and thunder shake the windows. They quiver and groan as though they're just waiting for that one powerful gust of wind to shatter them, but Tatsumi stands inches away, unconcerned with the prospect of glass shards imbedded in his skin.

In between the flashes of lightening, he can see himself reflected in the hotel room window, but he doesn't care to look. He's more concerned with the storm, or at least that's what he tells himself. When he was alive, a storm meant flood, and flood meant damaged buildings and swamped land. It bought disaster to his household, and he now tries to convince himself that the worry consuming him is left over from when he was alive.

He flinches in surprise when he feels a shock of pain in his finger. Tatsumi looks down and sees that he's torn his fingernail in the attempt to calm himself. After he watches it heal, he looks up again at the outside.

He thought he'd cured himself of that nervous habit.

A large thunderclap makes the ground quake and the lights in the building opposite flicker.

He sighs heavily as he closes his eyes. He puts his hand on the window. When he looks up, he sees that his breath has condensed on the glass and traces of evaporated water had become visible. The stoplight outside changes to red, and it looks like the city is stained with streaks of old blood.

Tatsumi is bitterly amused with the image and runs his fingers through the condensation lazily. He turns away from the window and leaves the small room. He doesn't have a place to stay in Kyoto, but he can't leave it. He can't leave Tsuzuki here, of all places. He supposes he'll be okay if Kurosaki is with him, but his reasons run deeper than just Tsuzuki's safety.

He had felt physically ill when he had told Tsuzuki to go to Kyoto, dizzy and weak. It was too soon, he thought, and he kept thinking that if he sent Tsuzuki to Kyoto he'd be sending him to his eternal death, his true death, although that was completely unfounded. But Tsuzuki had said he'd be fine, and he did trust Tsuzuki.

But then what was he doing here?

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Tsuzuki and Hisoka return to their hotel room an hour later, arguing over Tsuzuki's latest act of idiocy.

"You're just mad because you had to walk in the rain!" Tsuzuki accuses. He takes off his trench coat, and looks over the water damage.

The coat really wasn't meant for rain and was soaked through. At one point, Tsuzuki swore there had been a small lake in his pocket. He wished that things that belonged to shinigami could heal themselves, too. Now he'll be wet and cold tomorrow. He hangs it up and hopes it'll dry.

"I am not! Tsuzuki, how stupid was it to call me 'Hisoka?' You should have realized your error when I didn't answer!" Hisoka kicks his boots off angrily. They collide with the wall with a hollow 'clunk.'

"Well maybe you should've done more than just sit there! I thought you couldn't hear me!"

Hisoka stares at him. "So you say, 'Hisoka! Hey, Hisoka! Do you hear me, Hisoka?' when you knew Shiirain-san was in the next room?"

Tsuzuki pauses and then starts laughing. He scratches the back of his neck. "Well, I thought you couldn't hear…."

Hisoka shakes his wet hair and runs his fingers through it so it isn't in his eyes. He knows that scratching his neck was what Tsuzuki did when he saw sense and wanted to apologize, or when he didn't want to argue.

"God, you're so stupid," Hisoka says, but he's calming down, and they both know he doesn't mean it. He turns and hangs up his yellow coat.

Tsuzuki smiles and takes off his shoes, gripping about how wet he is, while Hisoka fights the urge to yell, "and whose fault was that!"

Hisoka turns on the lights and goes over to the window where the heater is, turning the heat on to 21 degrees, the standard temperature for them. Years ago they had spent a month arguing over what temperature room temperature was. It had ended in a broken heater, a large bill, and a grudging compromise.

Hisoka closes the panel and looks outside, marvelling at how much water there is. He's never seen so fierce a storm before. It was as though Mother Nature was waging war against humanity. And winning.

He then notices marks on the window. Three, the size of fingers, that run through condensation. He frowns. The energy was new, and they looked fresh. Someone had been in here.

He reaches and draws his fingers over the impressions on the window, feeling the emotional traces left behind.

Nervousness, worry, love, it makes him feel ill. An image of forked lightening outside and then a man's shadow reflected in the window in front of a dark room. The town runs with blood…? Then, clear blue eyes looking down, defeated.

Tatsumi had been here, and he was literally sick with worry.

"Too soon…." Hisoka whispers, unsure if the thought is his or not. He puts his hand at his side and looks at the marks. He's angry that Tatsumi has followed them. While he understands why Tatsumi came, he sees it as an act of distrust.

But he knows what Tatsumi is feeling, the consuming worry. He feels it himself. He'd been monitoring Tsuzuki closely, and he hadn't let him out of his sight, but he still couldn't help but fret. He couldn't tell with Tsuzuki.

It'd been years since Tsuzuki's suicide attempt, during which Tatsumi made sure that Tsuzuki was kept away from Kyoto. He'd even gone as far as to give them a month of work and a week to do it in so he could have an excuse to do the field work in Kyoto himself. Everyone in the office had volunteered to do it at least once for them. It was only when Saya complained about being in the area during winter Hisoka found out that they weren't being given those cases.

'Everybody loves Tsuzuki' was the impression Hisoka developed after a year of working in the Bureau. It took a crisis before he realized how much. When Tsuzuki was depressed a thick gloom hung over the office, like a fog. Everyone was depressed, and everyone had done everything they could to cheer him up, which included taking up their cases in Kyoto.

When Tatsumi had given them the assignment, he'd felt guilty, but Tsuzuki had felt nothing out of the ordinary, so Hisoka had assumed that Tsuzuki had finally recovered. But when they arrived, Tsuzuki had been nauseated by the sight of the playground where they'd found Mariko. When they walked through town, his cheerfulness faulted into a horrible black depression that made Hisoka feel terrible from just walking beside him.

What had unnerved him the most was that Tsuzuki had been smiling every moment of the day. His smile never faltered once.

Hisoka knew that time healed even the worst of scars, but he didn't know. He couldn't see if Tsuzuki's scars were healed if Tsuzuki never showed them to him. He could always go looking, but he wanted Tsuzuki to talk to him, to trust him.

"Hey, Hisoka! Since the Shiirains fed us, can we get room service?"

Hisoka turned, frowning. "You just ate."

"But we have 3,000 extra yen!"

"Dare I suggest you save it? Maybe you could buy a new coat. Yours is wearing out, I noticed. It has mold."

"But… but… cake!" Tsuzuki blubbered.

Hisoka rolled his eyes in exasperation, unwilling to admit defeat but knowing that he'd never be able to win in this.

Eventually he waved offhandedly and Tsuzuki hugged him violently from behind. Hisoka squawked in protest, and within two minutes everything on the dessert menu was in their room, and within ten, in Tsuzuki's stomach.

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It was a dismal park, really. There was dew on the grass and it was shining gold in the morning light, but that was the only remarkable thing. The park wasn't well kept, but Tatsumi remembers what it used to be, and in his mind, that's where he is.

When he'd last been here, there had been millions of flowers. They had blanketed the ground in a fantastic explosion of color. A Zen garden had been here, too, but it'd fallen into being a rock patch with small blades of grass poking out between gray stones.

It hurts to think of the past, but Tatsumi walks through the park anyways. The pathway is muddy and worms lay dying on it after the storm's waters bought them out, being baked by the sun and lack of water.

Tatsumi finds the spot he's looking for. He gives the bench an expressionless look. It used to be copper and blue, but now it's rusty green and chipped gray. He sits on the bench opposite after brushing away some water droplets. Somehow it seems inappropriate to sit where he's already been.

He watches the spot where he had been sitting a hundred years ago. He sees himself, exactly as he is today. The trees were much smaller then, but the grass was greener. It had been spring, not fall, and sunset, not sunrise. Tsuzuki had been sitting with him then.

The landscape changes, and it's 1929 again. He watches the past replay itself.

"I don't want to be a shinigami! I quit! I can't do this! I won't do this!"

Tsuzuki is breathing hard in long gasping breaths. He'd just taken his first soul, a young girl, dying of leukemia. He's covered in sweat and his sleeve is red with blood, a mixture of his own and the girl's. He's rocking back and forth on the blue bench.

Tatsumi was regretting making him take the soul, but Tsuzuki had been a shinigami for two years and still hasn't taken one. His last partner had complained that Tsuzuki refused to do his job, and so Konoe-kacho had paired Tatsumi with him with the orders to "get him into shape."

Tatsumi took the challenge in stride and had all but forced Tsuzuki to kill the girl. They'd impersonated doctors, sitting in on the operation so they could see what was then the modern way of treating leukemia. They'd watched, and after much prodding from Tatsumi, he'd taken the soul.

When Tsuzuki realized the girl was dead, he fell to his knees. Tatsumi had grabbed his arm on the way down to slow him. He hadn't been expecting a reaction like that. There was nothing left the doctors could do, and everyone left the room except for them.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Tsuzuki said to the body, over and over again. He took the lifeless hand and brought it to his face. "I'm sorry."

He let the hand drop, and grabbed a surgical knife, driving it into his arm, through it, crushing bone and tearing muscles. Tatsumi watched through saddened eyes as Tsuzuki gave a pained cry laced with desperation. He fell to his knees and doubled up, and twisted the knife still further. Tatsumi couldn't look at it, so he looked out the window as though he weren't conscious of the man before him.

"Come on, Tsuzuki-san. Iuro Park is nearby. We can talk there."

Tsuzuki's eyes had turned glassy. "I deserve it. I do. I deserve to die. It should've been me. I deserve it," he had said, as his clothes slowly turned red.

Tatsumi had to drag him out of the hospital and to the park, although after the first block it only took a hand on Tsuzuki's upper arm to keep him steady. They'd found an out-of-the-way bench to sit on, and Tatsumi had told Tsuzuki that whenever he was ready to, he could start talking; he would not pry. Until a few minutes ago, Tsuzuki had sat in a stupor, trying to wish himself into non-existence, but something had snapped, as Tatsumi knew it would.

"Relax, Tsuzuki-san," he said.

"No! No! Killing someone is not okay, Tatsumi-san! How many people, humans! have you killed that you've become so jaded!"

Tatsumi looks around, hoping no one can hear. The last thing he needs right now is to deal with the mortal police.

"Keep your voice down," he whispers sharply.

Tsuzuki looks at him in amazement.

"You don't care? Do you even know the number?"

Tatsumi says a random number he thinks will sound reasonable. "One hundred forty eight, now please, your voice."

"We're monsters! Demons! Murderers!"

Tsuzuki starts to rock more violently.

Tatsumi frowns in annoyance. He sneers. He doesn't want to hear the truth in Tsuzuki's words, so he says, "yes, we are. That's all we are. We're humans who were so ugly and sinful we turned into monsters."

Tsuzuki stares in disbelief.

"I'm joking," he explained. Tsuzuki must be too upset to hear the sarcasm, he concludes.

Tsuzuki's eyes water and he frowns. He buries his hands in his hair and doubles up.

Tatsumi huffs and looks away. He watches a young couple for a few minutes, and then his eyes fall onto a Zen garden.

'This is pathetic,' Tatsumi thinks. 'This man is a sensitive fool.'

Yet he can't help but feel sorry for him, or is it for himself and his lost morality? Either way, his partner's tears pull at his heart, and he decides he has to say something.

The Zen garden makes him think of an old English saying.

"'Go easy, and if you can't go easy, go as easy as you can.'"

Tsuzuki looks up at Tatsumi's face, but remains doubled up.

"Don't make things harder than they have to be. You shouldn't blame yourself because there was nothing you could do. If you hadn't killed that girl, I would've. And if I hadn't, time would've."

Tsuzuki leaned back against the bench, still breathing hard.

"What does time mean when you're immortal?" He sighs and blinks tears from his eyes. "What does life mean when you're immortal?" He shakes his head before putting it in his hands. "Why did I agree to this? I was thinking only of myself. I should have taken Hell."

Tatsumi's eyes slide away from Tsuzuki.

Tsuzuki put his head on Tatsumi's shoulder as he looses what little control he has left. Tatsumi wrinkles his nose, but let's Tsuzuki weep, lets him mourn, both for the girl and his lost humanity. After a minute, his heart twists, and he puts his arm around Tsuzuki protectively.

For the first time in his life he doesn't care about appearances or his noble blood. Let people think what they want. Tsuzuki needed him like… like his mother had.

Tatsumi pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. To anyone he would look completely unconcerned about anything, and that's how he wants it. No one could possibly understand, anyways.

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"Well, at least it isn't raining," Tsuzuki says. He shivers when the wind blows. His coat is still wet and he's slowly freezing to death, but the lake in his pocket has become a pond.

"Optimistic to a fault, that's what you are," Hisoka says, wrapping himself tightly in his yellow coat.

"I thought you hated heat, not cold," Tsuzuki says, poking the side of Hisoka's head. Hisoka swats his hand away.

"I don't mind being chilly, but I object to being frozen."

Tsuzuki laughs. He should have expected that response.

"So what's the plan for today?"

"The Shiirain family goes on a walk on Sunday mornings."

"We're going to look through their house?" Tsuzuki asks, eyeing a noodle stand about to open for the day.

"Follow them as spirits."

"To see if the daughter is…?"

"Yes. I just need to be closer to tell what's happening to her."

"I don't see how-…" Tsuzuki began.

"Yeah, but if you recall, someone blew our cover."

"I'm sorry!"

"I know you are, but Tsuzuki…."

"I'll try and remember next time."

Hisoka gave him a rare smile, although they'd become more frequent in the last year. "That's what you said last time."

Tsuzuki opened his mouth.

"And don't tell me you mean it this time, because you said that last time."

Tsuzuki gave him a 'well don't you know everything?' look. "You forgot to call me an 'idiot.'"

"Don't tempt me."

They walk side by side to the Shiirain house, where they'd been last night.

It was an old, run down building, and it looked even more so this morning with down branches and debris from the storm. The father can't pay to keep it up, the mother doesn't care, and neither do the children when they bother coming home. It's a happy household, smoothly run. No one talks to anyone else about anything serious, but no one ever complains. Easy pickings for a demon. They all act happy to disguise their pain, so no one suspects the change.

They wait ten minutes before the family emerges and they both switch to spirit form.

"She reeks of demon energy," Tsuzuki says, watching the daughter keenly.

"She's human."

"Possession?"

"I can't feel anything from her."

"From her, or….?"

"Nothing demonic."

Tsuzuki scratches the back of his head. "Then what?"

"Maybe she's being used as an anchor. Attaching a demon to her and this plane?"

"Possibly."

"I need to be closer," Hisoka says, starting off. Tsuzuki follows him.

They follow close enough to overhear what the family says to one other, but far enough so that the Shiirains won't run into them, as humans didn't like running into things they can't see.

They walk along a sidewalk dusted in leaves and the golden sunlight. It was quite pleasant, Tsuzuki thought. He may be freezing, but the Sun was helping with that. It shone brightly through the red and gold trimmed trees casting beautifully shaped shadows. He felt like he was walking through a painting.

They walk a few more blocks before they come to a park. Tsuzuki looks into it and is saddened by how ill kept it is. There were entire sections of dirt and dust where the grass had died. When they passed under the metal arch, Tsuzuki saw the park's name and stopped dead.

Hisoka felt the jolt of surprise and dread sharply. He'd been expecting emotional stress, but from the girl in front of him, not the man behind. He looked over his shoulder and saw Tsuzuki staring at the arch, mouth open in shock.

"Tsuzuki?" he whispered.

Tsuzuki made a small noise like he meant to talk, but nothing came out.

Iuro. The rusted sign actually said Iuro.

"Come on, Tsuzuki-san. Iuro Park is nearby. We can talk there," Tatsumi's voice says to him. He remembered. That child! Oh, God, that child!

His arm burned with the memory of being stabbed through.

"I can't go in there. I'm sorry, Hisoka. I can't go in there."

Tsuzuki looks at Hisoka, who was watching him with a worried frown.

He smiles. "I'll wait for you here," he said.

"Tsuzuki, I don't think it's a good idea to split up."

"Don't worry. I just… I just…. I'll wait here."

"Tell me later?" Hisoka asks.

Tsuzuki averts his eyes guiltily.

He just wants to forget.

Hisoka turns to face him. "I'm not leaving you alone."

"I can protect myself."

"From yourself?" Hisoka asks. It's harsh, but sometimes that's all Tsuzuki understands.

Tsuzuki loses some of the glint in his eyes.

"We'll follow them when they come out," Hisoka says.

"No! Hisoka, please. Go, follow. I'll be fine, I promise."

Hisoka hesitates. He really doesn't want to leave Tsuzuki, but what could he say to justify staying? He turned half-way to look at the family, torn between duties. If it weren't for those empty smiles, Hisoka wouldn't worry. It was the fact that Tsuzuki was deceiving him that make him upset.

"I hate it when you lie to me," he says. He doesn't look at Tsuzuki. He waits a second, and then resigns himself to his investigation, walking quickly so he could catch up to the family.

It was the look in Tsuzuki's eyes and the feeling of guilt that made him go. He couldn't protect Tsuzuki all the time. Tsuzuki was powerful, more powerful than he was, and Tsuzuki didn't need to be baby-sat. He could protect himself.

And the reverse, his mind prodded.

Hisoka ignored himself.

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Tatsumi watched the sky as he left the park. He wondered if he hadn't made a mistake by coming. He'd opened old wounds. No, he'd ripped open scarred skin.

Had it really scarred? he wondered.

No, not yet. There were still nights when he longed to have Tsuzuki curled up next to him. There were still moments when he wanted nothing more than to have Tsuzuki with him.

He remembers one of the nights after their first month as partners, back when Tsuzuki's dreams still terrified him. Tatsumi had noticed that his partner didn't sleep unless he collapsed from exhaustion, so he'd insisted that Tsuzuki sleep next to him, promising to wake him if his dreams turned violent. When they had been together like that, Tatsumi found that all his worries became unimportant. His mind quieted and he began to grasp inklings of peace.

Several times during their partnership Tsuzuki would sleep in Tatsumi's apartment in the Bureau, back when they both owned one, and if that wasn't where he started his night, that's where he ended it, curled up next to Tatsumi, sleeping soundly.

The day after Tatsumi terminated their partnership, for he refused to call it a 'relationship,' Tsuzuki rented out an apartment in Tokyo, where he'd grown up, and had lived there ever since.

He remembers the moment he told Tsuzuki their partnership was over. He had been shaking inside, but spoke evenly. It was necessary, he told himself. Necessary.

For a second, Tsuzuki's eyes had looked lifeless, and Tatsumi couldn't hold back anymore, his desire to protect Tsuzuki flaring up again. He started crying, feeling helpless. That night, when he finally got to sleep, he dreamed he'd murdered Tsuzuki, cut him up and tortured him before stabbing him through the heart.

But it hadn't been him. It _was_ him, but those weren't his actions. He'd fought, harder and harder with every plea Tsuzuki made, but couldn't' stop himself. The blood, the tears... they just wouldn't stop.

Tatsumi only realized what he'd let go of after it walked out on him. He thought only of himself, only of his sanity. He'd forgotten that Tsuzuki bought peace. Tsuzuki kept him sane; it was in his absence that Tatsumi thought he was going mad.

'If only, if only,' his mind chides.

What a mistake he'd made. He and Tsuzuki were as close as they were ever going to be now. When Tsuzuki had been ready to kill himself, Tatsumi found that he would loose nothing but an old friend. He hadn't even fought for him. He'd agreed to let Tsuzuki kill himself. If Kurosaki hadn't been there, well, he didn't want to think of it.

'Damned to this life of longing, were death doesn't make a difference,' he thinks, but not bitterly.

"Tatsumi!"

Tatsumi started at his name being called cheerfully. For a brief second he thought it might be someone he knew who had recognized him from long ago, but it had been so long since he'd been here, that was impossible.

Tsuzuki's smiling face greeted him when he looked up, his figure illuminated by the Sun behind him.

"I would never have expected to see you here. What's up? Uh oh. This isn't about the 3,000 yen, is it?" Tsuzuki put a hand over his mouth when he realized what he said and looked up at Tatsumi with wide eyes.

Tatsumi looks at him as he walks over. "Depends. What happened to it?"

"I was hungry! And… and… I needed food!" Tsuzuki said, trying to come up with an excuse and failing.

Tatsumi was going to scold him, but he really wasn't in the mood for economics or budgets. Those would be unimportant in a few years, anyways.

"Well, I hope you enjoyed it," Tatsumi said, watching leaves in a whirlwind nearby. "Whatever it was."

Tsuzuki gave him a look of complete disbelief and found himself tilting sideways.

"Actually I'm here because I wanted to see the park. It's been eighty years. Can you believe how much disarray it's fallen into?" Tatsumi asks. He crosses his arms and leans against the French-style railing and Tsuzuki follows suit, hands in his pockets.

"I haven't been inside."

Tatsumi looks at Tsuzuki in time to see him lower his eyes to his shoes.

"Well, maybe that's best. You don't want the park's memory spoiled of when it was beautiful."

Tsuzuki asked, "was it beautiful?"

Guilt shifted in Tatsumi's chest and it felt as though it was accusing him of being the source of Tsuzuki's unhappiness, and he was, wasn't he? He would never let himself forget that.

Tatsumi looked at the Sun rising over Tsuzuki's shoulder and as the wind blew past, catching leaves in another whirlwind, his entire life seemed to become unimportant except for this one moment. This was what his life was supposed to have been like.

But he forced himself to stop thinking of the past. What mattered was this moment, nothing more. He was with Tsuzuki. That was enough. He wasn't holding him like he once had, but somehow this was better after being apart for so long, fresh air after suffocating.

The moment lasted forever, but what was forever when you were immortal?

Sometimes he felt like he'd lived too long.

Tsuzuki shuddered violently in the wind, and Tatsumi noticed the state of his former partner's dress.

"Tsk, a wet coat? You're insane to be wearing that in this weather."

"It was raining last night, and it's too cold to go without," Tsuzuki explained.

Tatsumi pushed off lightly from the railing and removed his brown trench coat.

"Oh, no, Tatsumi. I couldn't take yours."

"I'm going back to the Bureau. I don't need it."

Tsuzuki hesitated. "Are you sure?"

Tatsumi nodded and Tsuzuki removed his coat, handed it to Tatsumi, and took the brown one. When he slipped it on, it was pleasantly warm with Tatsumi's body heat. For a second, he was standing with Tatsumi again. He was being comforted. Tatsumi had one of his arms around Tsuzuki's back, and the other hand was running through his hair, soothing him. Tsuzuki had never felt more content in his life as he had back then. The coat smelled like him, too, and that helped complete the illusion.

"Thank you, Tatsumi-san! It's much better!"

In fact, it was just what he needed.

Tatsumi smiled and looked back at the Sun. The leaves were starting to loose their red and gold tint.

They watched the sunrise for a while with the lack of conversation only old friends can enjoy. When a squirrel came along the fence, Tsuzuki let it sit on his shoulder. He smiled at it and asked it silly questions as Tatsumi watched with smiling eyes.

Tatsumi loved seeing Tsuzuki happy, but there was still that edge of sadness, a tint of gloom he couldn't remove; that he couldn't do anything about. That he was responsible for.

That tortured him.

Tatsumi watched Tsuzuki for a few seconds more before shifting the wet coat over his arm. He reached out with both hands and tilted Tsuzuki's head up. Tsuzuki was startled by the gesture, and looked up at Tatsumi with large questioning eyes. Tatsumi smiled at him reassuringly.

The purple eyes were bright, but they were still bruised by all the man had been through.

He knew that he had been the cause of that bruising and had done nothing to stop it. He hadn't been there when Tsuzuki needed him. He'd had every opportunity to make amends, but he just couldn't face the fact that he'd made a mistake.

He looked back on everything, occasionally, and every time he did he forced himself to forget and look ahead while the storm of the past raged behind him.

Tatsumi lowered his head until their foreheads touched, like a mother's to her sick child's to take it's temperature.

"Remember, 'go easy,'" he whispered. It was the best he could do.

Recognition wrote itself across Tsuzuki's features. If it hadn't been for his bangs shaking, Tatsumi would have never noticed the nod when he pulled back.

"I'll have this dry cleaned for you," Tatsumi said, indicating the coat. "I'll see you at home, Tsuzuki-san." Tatsumi nodded a bow and walked away. He wanted to stay longer, but he didn't dare linger in the past.

"Bye, Tatsumi!" Tsuzuki yelled, waving.

This time Tatsumi did look back, and he was smiling.

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It's night when Tatsumi and Tsuzuki leave Iuro Park. The sky is black as it always is before it turns navy and the stars come out. Tsuzuki has just pulled himself together, although Tatsumi can tell it was taking all he had.

"Tatsumi-san…."

"Hn?"

"Promise me something."

"If I can."

"Tatsumi, I'm immortal. Everyone I know is going to die."

Tatsumi nodded. "A sad truth, but still a truth."

"Promise me you won't? I can't stand the idea of being alone for eternity. I probably deserve it, but when everyone I know is dead…"

"You'll make more acquaintances. They don't all die at once."

Tatsumi looked over at Tsuzuki. It was only because of the shadows he could see him well. The gas lamps hadn't been lit yet.

"I know, I know, but it isn't the same as having an old friend. Tatsumi, promise me that even if we get reassigned, you'll stay near me?"

Tatsumi smiled softly and to himself.

"As long as you need me, and as long as I can, I'll be there for you. I'm your partner, after all."

Tsuzuki started tearing.

"I'm sorry. I just hate being alone. It's such a relief, and…" Tsuzuki said, wiping his eyes.

Tatsumi studies him for a few more paces before he puts his arm around Tsuzuki and pulls him close.

"Shh, there's no need to cry. I promise."

In the back of Tatsumi's mind, a memory prickles. A woman in white asks him to care for her. The memory is fuzzy, and the woman's face is missing, but she's wearing white, that much Tatsumi remembers.

He promised her his love and care, and then he killed her a month later.

He wasn't prosecuted for that murder, either.

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For Tsuzuki's 106th birthday, today, and yes, I realize how nerdy it is that I know that it is his birthday.


End file.
